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Hands-on: Opera 11 tab stacking vs Firefox Panorama

Opera has released a beta of Opera 11, the next major version of its Web …

The latest beta release of Opera 11, which was made available this week, offers an intriguing twist on tab management. Opera has introduced a new feature called tab stacking that allows users to combine individual tabs into groups. Although tab stacking is still at an early stage of development, the feature shows considerable promise and is an excellent addition to Opera 11.

Opera's tab stacking feature tackles the same set of problems that Mozilla is attempting to solve with Firefox Panaroma, the tab grouping interface that will land in Firefox 4. Despite similar goals, Opera and Mozilla have implemented very different tab management solutions. In this article, we will compare the two and look at the relative strengths and weaknesses of each approach.

Before we dive into the details, it's worth taking a minute to revisit the actual problem. Tabbed browsing was a real game changer when it was first introduced, but it hasn't aged very well. A conventional tab bar just doesn't scale acceptably past about 15 or 20 individual webpages. When tab titles get truncated to the point of uselessness, effective navigation becomes a serious challenge. Common tab overflow mechanisms like Firefox's scrolling tab bar or Opera windows' side pane can partly mitigate the problem, but aren't intended to be standard tab navigation methods. There is obviously a need for a more elastic tab management user interface, one that will handle overflow elegantly without compromising ease of use or efficient navigation.

Firefox Panorama, which was previously called Tab Candy, provides a special tab management dashboard view that shows thumbnails of all the open tabs in the window and allows users to organize the tabs into clusters. Clicking a thumbnail will jump to the associated tab group and activate the selected tab. Opera's tab stacking feature is much less elaborate, but arguably comes very close to matching Panorama's feature set while incurring a lower cost in complexity.

Opera users can drag tabs on top of each other to create expandable stacks in the tab bar. A collapsed stack will show only a single tab from the group. A small arrow icon to the right of each tab stack can be clicked to expand the stack, making its constituent tabs spread out across the tab bar. Expanding one stack will collapse all of the other stacks in the bar. When you hover your cursor over a stack, the browser will display a bubble with thumbnails of all the tabs in the stack. You can click one of the thumbnails to switch to the associated tab. It's possible to move a tab from one stack to another by dragging the thumbnail from the bubble or the actual tab that appears in the bar when a stack is expanded.

It's difficult to describe clearly, but it's quite simple when you see it in action. In the screenshots above, there are two tab stacks and one tab that is not associated with any stack. The first stack has several news webistes, including Ars and Reddit. The second stack has a bunch of Qt programming documentation. In the first screenshot, the stacks are all collapsed. In the second screenshot, the news stack is expanded so that its contents are visible in the tab bar. In the screenshot below, you can see the bubble that appears when the user hovers over a stack:

One of the primary characteristics that differentiates Opera's stacks from Firefox Panorama is that Opera will always show you all of the available groups in your tab bar whereas Firefox will only show you the active group. In order to see all of your groups in Firefox, you have to switch to the Panorama view. Opera's approach has some advantages and disadvantages. I think that the most obvious advantage of it is that it makes it harder to forget when you have a bunch of extra tab groups open.

A lot of people use tabs instead of bookmarks for things that they want to read later, and it's easy to forget those if they aren't right in front of you. Tabs become a combination of a visual to-do list and task manager—provided you see them.

Firefox's approach of hiding the inactive groups away in a separate dashboard eliminates the sense of omnipresence that typically accompanies an open tab. Opera still hides most of your stacked tabs, but retains to a greater sense that the open tabs are still there. The downside is that inactive tab groups can start to feel like clutter and waste space that you might rather see devoted to the expanded group.

I think that the simplicity of tab stacks might make it more intuitive than Panorama to a mainstream audience. Panorama burdens the user with the jarring context switch to a completely separate view, whereas Opera's stacks more seamlessly integrate with the existing tab management interface, which is already familiar to users.

The main advantages that Panorama has over Opera's stacks are higher scalability and greater conduciveness to extensibility. The fact that Opera keeps all of the stacks around in the tab bar creates a lower ceiling for the number of tab groups that you can create in a window before the interface loses its efficacy. (It's worth noting that there isn't really a limit on the number of tabs in an individual group because the popup bubbles can scroll.) Firefox's use of the separate dashboard ensures that you have plenty of space to lay out your groups, making it easier to manage a large number of them.

The extensibility factor is also really significant. The dashboard can support a richer and more flexible presentation of tab groups than Opera's stacks. Mozilla has already demonstrated some really interesting ways in which Panorama could theoretically be extended in the future to add functionality like tab sharing tools or more specialized tab management behaviors. I think that it will likely be harder to do those kinds of things with Opera's more streamlined tab interface.

The work that Opera has done so far on tab stacks is impressive, but there are still some bugs and limitations. For example, the browser crashed several times while I was experimenting with tab stacks and multiple windows, and I ran into serious problems when I attempted to drag a tab stack from one window to another. This is not surprising, given the beta status of Opera 11. It's likely that problems of this nature will be resolved by the time that the final version of Opera 11 is released.

As a chronic tabaholic, I'm very happy to see browser vendors working on innovative ways to improve tabbed browsing. Mozilla and Opera have both concocted powerful and compelling solutions that will boost tab management in the coming year. For more details about Opera 11 and a video that demonstrates the new tabbed browsing features, you can refer to the Opera website. Intrepid users who want to try out the beta release can download it directly from Opera.

Ryan Paul / Ryan is an Ars editor emeritus in the field of open source, and and still contributes regularly. He manages developer relations at Montage Studio.

How about recursive tab stacks....tab stacks of tab stacks to keep stuff even more hidden. Also I'd love the ability to save a tab stack group like a super-bookmark, and close it, that could also help the clutter.

I liked these when I first saw them, but what really sold me was the double clicking. Double clicking on a tab group expands it. Then, double clicking on one of the tabs in the group selects it as the active tab and collapses the group back down.

Up until now, I have relied on holding the right mouse button and scrolling when I have tons of tabs open. This will be a welcome addition to that.

This is probably a lot more positive of an update to someone like myself. I already use Opera for everything so new features like this fit in very nicely with the flow of how I already operate. I am curious to see how people that are new to Opera react to this.

Edit: Dang, it looks like tab group functionality isn't available for mouse gestures yet. I guess that is coming later. I was hoping to to replace the Fast Forward and Rewind mouse gestures with expand and collapse. Guess it'll have to wait until it's a full release.

I love opera. Having switched from firefox a few years ago, I can't use any other browser, without missing opera. It's as fast as chrome, prettier, and has more features. Chrome loses. It literally has no advantage.

How about recursive tab stacks....tab stacks of tab stacks to keep stuff even more hidden. Also I'd love the ability to save a tab stack group like a super-bookmark, and close it, that could also help the clutter.

How about Turing-complete tab stacks? They'll decide when to show themselves and when to kill the user.

This is far nicer than Panorama, at least in its current form. Panorama is cute as a gimmick, but it simply takes too much time to bring it up, and then to select whichever tab or group of tabs that you want.

Tab Stack is simple, clean and efficient. It's certainly not perfect (I would rather the tabs show up on a second row of tabs rather than the thumbnail representation) but then again, I've only been aware of it for perhaps five minutes. So maybe there are ways to configure it.

I'm definitely one of those people who uses tabs instead of bookmarks. A bookmark is something I want to access repeatedly, but if I just leave a tab open, it's something I just want to read through when I get some time and interest, then close and be done with it. Features like this will help me a lot.

I guess it's important for some people.I never have more than 3 tabs open. I don't understand the point of having 25 tabs. I just watch one tab. I may open another tab for a quick look and so I can quickly get back to the main tab. I close it right after. I may open another one but that's it.When I see my girlfriend browsing, she always have at least 20 open tabs. I never got why.

Swiping the mouse to the left screen boundary would pop up a sidebar listing all the open tabs/tasks* with the rest of the screen holding a 75% preview of whatever page the mouse was hovering over in the list. All pages from the same site would automatically group together under the same reused subheading. Click to switch the foreground tab. The sidebar disappears when you mouse off it to the right (a bit like the "Dock" in OS X) and the page scales up as the sidebar slides off screen with the lower portion of the page sliding out of view (as it is now displaying the page at 100% on a landscape screen).

All forms of horizontal tabs are a conceptual cul-de-sac.

*this is because in Google Chrome, these two concepts are synonymous, every tab has its own VM.

I love opera. Having switched from firefox a few years ago, I can't use any other browser, without missing opera. It's as fast as chrome, prettier, and has more features. Chrome loses. It literally has no advantage.

Prettier? PRETTIER? Are we talking about the same Opera browser? The one that I took to calling Gothpera because of its predilection for changing its nice looking, colorful icons to ugly, black and white icons in newer releases?

I moved from Firefox 2 to Opera 9 (you know, the nice looking one), then 10, before Firefox's non-fugly UI and better extensions support drew me back to Firefox 3.

I love opera. Having switched from firefox a few years ago, I can't use any other browser, without missing opera. It's as fast as chrome, prettier, and has more features. Chrome loses. It literally has no advantage.

Here are the results from yesterday of 39 bench mark tests. It places Opera in 3rd place, behind IE9 and Chrome 9. Please post your results, or is this just based on a personal biased. If you like a clunky, "prettier" browser, by all means, please stick to Opera, but dont make baseless blanket statements, without providing some source or reference to it. You should really add "IMO" to you posts instead.

Here are the results from yesterday of 39 bench mark tests. It places Opera in 3rd place, behind IE9 and Chrome 9. Please post your results, or is this just based on a personal biased. If you like a clunky, "prettier" browser, by all means, please stick to Opera, but dont make baseless blanket statements, without providing some source or reference to it. You should really add "IMO" to you posts instead.

Wait, what? So because Opera is not #1 in this particular test (while it is in many others), it's "clunky"? Also, if he needs to add "IMO", why aren't you adding it before bashing Opera?

mexter wrote:

Tab Stack is simple, clean and efficient. It's certainly not perfect (I would rather the tabs show up on a second row of tabs rather than the thumbnail representation) but then again, I've only been aware of it for perhaps five minutes. So maybe there are ways to configure it.

I guess you already saw that you can double-click to expand/collapse each stack?

deleter8 wrote:

How about recursive tab stacks....tab stacks of tab stacks to keep stuff even more hidden. Also I'd love the ability to save a tab stack group like a super-bookmark, and close it, that could also help the clutter.

Use separate windows, and you almost have groups within groups.

Of course, Panorama is a lot more flexible than Opera's tab stacks, but it comes with some overhead.

Opera's tab side pane (which is largely what Firefox's Tree Style Tabs extension copies) is mentioned in the article.

It's not. Opera (at least as of 10.63 since I don't use betas) with the tabs on the side is nothing like what Tree Style Tabs offers in terms of hierarchical sorting unless there's an option I missed (which would be easy with Opera's inane interface).

Here are the results from yesterday of 39 bench mark tests. It places Opera in 3rd place, behind IE9 and Chrome 9. Please post your results, or is this just based on a personal biased. If you like a clunky, "prettier" browser, by all means, please stick to Opera, but dont make baseless blanket statements, without providing some source or reference to it. You should really add "IMO" to you posts instead.

"Wait, what? So because Opera is not #1 in this particular test (while it is in many others), it's "clunky"? Also, if he needs to add "IMO", why aren't you adding it before bashing Opera?"

Because it's not my opinion or based on 1 test. It's an objective statement, based on 39 benchmark tests. Did you even bother to read the article, or are you just being a keyboard cowboy, and sticking up for Opera? Umad bro?

And if you werent such a knob, there are some tests Opera 11 does better in, so please tell me how it's bashing? hahaha you cant even argue correctly. That other tool stated "It literally has no advantage", I proved it wrong by a battery of 39 bench mark tests that were given to all major Browsers. He gave opinion, I gave documented tests. I can see youre a fanboy, but know who youre battling, You wont win.

Oh my, Opera takes the third place in a series of benchmarks, call the cops! I'm uninstalling it right now, and formatting the hard drive, just to make sure.

Please learn how ot debate in context, you look like an intellectual midget. My post was in reference to "It literally has no advantage" which I bascially demolished with a battery of 39 objective tests. You come on an post "durdurdurdurdur". Youre a moron.

I guess it's important for some people.I never have more than 3 tabs open. I don't understand the point of having 25 tabs. I just watch one tab. I may open another tab for a quick look and so I can quickly get back to the main tab. I close it right after. I may open another one but that's it.When I see my girlfriend browsing, she always have at least 20 open tabs. I never got why.

That's why we do have multiple window managers. I choose which one to start based on what I'm going to do: when I just need a few windows, grouped into one or two tasks I use 2wm (hacked to start in monacle mode, which it sadly doesn't have), for studying and homework assignments I tend to use dwm, which allows me to keep my homework open but tagged as "g", while viewing windows tagged "WWW" and "IRC" only. At last, I use wmii when I want to do more advanced window management (it can manage windows recursively into columns, so you've got a third of your screen maximized, another third tiled and the third stacked (simple but confusing vertical tabs).

Uncompetative wrote:

How about a mode for maximised browser views?

Like Monacle mode of DWM (and probably others)? I use them a lot, though I sometimes keep a status bar at the bottom of my screen (to remind me of what tags have windows, what time it is, cut.1 ACPI thermostats and, when my battery is plugged in (it isn't ATM) charge stats and when the heat level is less than 99°C, the letters OK - to calm me down when my lap's burning. Writing this, I figure it should probably have DON'T PANIC when my battery is unplugged .

Currently though, I'm using WMII with two columns (Google's GMail webapp and Arstechnica) so I can switch easily between while one is loading (why are web pages so big these days? No, I do not want to press this image of a bird flying into the word "Tweet" colored blue, no matter what Twitter pays you for the affiliation). Just wanted to recall how it works, as I rarely need the additional features it has over dwm.

I am trying Opera 11 right now and I have to say that although it's a beautiful piece of software, the performance difference between it and Chrome is apparent. About the tab stacks, personally I would prefer it if it gave you the option to automatically put into the stack a new tab that you opened from a site. Say I middle click a link in this site, I would like it to put the new tab into the stack of this site. In that way it makes a lot more sense to me. I think it would be much more useful in this way. I mean how many times did you middle click a ton of new sites and ended up having a bunch of tabs not knowing where they all came from...

Because it's not my opinion or based on 1 test. It's an objective statement, based on 39 benchmark tests. Did you even bother to read the article, or are you just being a keyboard cowboy, and sticking up for Opera? Umad bro?

Claiming that Opera is "clunky" is indeed just an opinion, and a poorly founded one at that.

What should I be reading from the article you linked to? It certainly does not state that Opera is clunky or slow.

In fact, if you look at the test, Opera is the one without hardware acceleration, and yet it's right up there with the hardware accelerated browsers! That shows that Opera is anything but clunky. It shows that Opera is very fast indeed without needing hardware acceleration.

Oh my, Opera takes the third place in a series of benchmarks, call the cops! I'm uninstalling it right now, and formatting the hard drive, just to make sure.

Please learn how ot debate in context, you look like an intellectual midget. My post was in reference to "It literally has no advantage" which I bascially demolished with a battery of 39 objective tests. You come on an post "durdurdurdurdur". Youre a moron.

Because it's not my opinion or based on 1 test. It's an objective statement, based on 39 benchmark tests. Did you even bother to read the article, or are you just being a keyboard cowboy, and sticking up for Opera? Umad bro?

Claiming that Opera is "clunky" is indeed just an opinion, and a poorly founded one at that.

What should I be reading from the article you linked to? It certainly does not state that Opera is clunky or slow.

In fact, if you look at the test, Opera is the one without hardware acceleration, and yet it's right up there with the hardware accelerated browsers! That shows that Opera is anything but clunky. It shows that Opera is very fast indeed without needing hardware acceleration.

My post was in reference to "It literally has no advantage" which I bascially demolished with a battery of 39 objective tests.

I'm sorry, but the test shows no such thing. It's one test out of many out there, taken at one particular time with specific builds. Things change all the time.

Quote:

I can see youre a fanboy

He is, is he? Are there any other fanboys here?

Quote:

you look like an intellectual midget

Quote:

Youre a moron.

Wow.

Youre an idiot. Did you even go to the websites you just linked here or did you just go on a Google manhunt? Some of them dont even have Opera 11 on their tests ahahaha wow, youre sad. Also, my response was to that poster saying about Chrome "It literally has no advantage." Which I proved wrong with a series of 39 benchmark tests. You my friend, are a terrible troll, and just cant accept being better by someone much smarter than youll ever be.

Youre an idiot. Did you even go to the websites you just linked here or did you just go on a Google manhunt? Some of them dont even have Opera 11 on their tests ahahaha wow, youre sad. Also, my response was to that poster saying about Chrome "It literally has no advantage." Which I proved wrong with a series of 39 benchmark tests. You my friend, are a terrible troll, and just cant accept being better by someone much smarter than youll ever be.

The point is that different benchmarks show different things at different times. Taking one specific benchmarks testing specific builds at a specific time and claiming based that single benchmark that one is objectively faster is flat out wrong.

"10.70" is really Opera 11, by the way. They just hadn't renamed it to 11.0 yet. And the links were to illustrate my point that "fastest" is not some universal truth, but rather dependent on when you test, what is tested, and what you use to test.

How does this single specific test show that Chrome has an advantage? Is it meant to show that Chrome is objectively the fastest? As I have explained, it does not such thing.

And you also claimed that Opera was "clunky", which you also claimed to be objective, but which you have failed to provide a single valid argument for.

LMFAO only two of the links you provided even test Opera 11 and in the article they even state some advantages of Chrome over Opera hahah "It literally has no advantage." thank you for backing me up bro, troll on!!

LMFAO only two of the links you provided even test Opera 11 and in the article they even state some advantages of Chrome over Opera hahah "It literally has no advantage." thank you for backing me up bro, troll on!!

I already explained that 10.70 is basically older builds of Opera 11. I added them to illustrate how tests depend on the things I mentioned.

I still don't understand what advantage you are saying that Chrome has. It certainly can't be performance, since there's no clear and objective winners since different tests show different things.

I am trying Opera 11 right now and I have to say that although it's a beautiful piece of software, the performance difference between it and Chrome is apparent. About the tab stacks, personally I would prefer it if it gave you the option to automatically put into the stack a new tab that you opened from a site. Say I middle click a link in this site, I would like it to put the new tab into the stack of this site. In that way it makes a lot more sense to me. I think it would be much more useful in this way. I mean how many times did you middle click a ton of new sites and ended up having a bunch of tabs not knowing where they all came from...

Actually, go to Preferences (Ctrl+F12) -> Advanced and set "Loading" to "Redraw Instantly". Voila, Chrome's advantage evaporates. Yes, in other words, the difference is almost entirely subjective.

Of course, there are a few objective differences: Chrome has DNS prefetching so it loads new pages slightly faster, while Opera has superior rendering performance (try zooming in on arstechnica.com or gamedev.net to see the difference). However, the difference you see is mostly an illusion.

Why does Opera use a mode that "feels" slower by default? Because it reduces power consumption and makes reflows on pages with lots of elements less jarring.

The feature itself seems to take quite a lot of space and I assume requires an extra click OR wait-hovering over the arrow. I rather the option of having another row of tabs when the maximum is reached.

I read all kinds of benchmark tests at various times for various releases of various browsers, saying this or that browser is the fastest by some number of milliseconds in javascript rendering or image downloading or this or that. When it comes down to it, though, for me, it boils down to look and feel. I generally use the bleeding-edge browsers - alpha or beta of each, when available. And if one looks or feels faster, then that's the one I'll use. I'm fickle. Right now, I'm using Chrome. In the past, I've used Webkit nightlies. Opera is indeed close to as fast as these, but it's never "felt" quite equal, in spite of all the tests you may throw at me. I'm not a fanboy. Just a web designer, avid surfer, and fickle browser user.

The feature itself seems to take quite a lot of space and I assume requires an extra click OR wait-hovering over the arrow. I rather the option of having another row of tabs when the maximum is reached.

I prefer to open a new window, but that's just me.

I really like the tab stacks: I keep dozens of progamming-related tabs open at all times and this allows me to switch between tasks faster than ever.

LMFAO only two of the links you provided even test Opera 11 and in the article they even state some advantages of Chrome over Opera hahah "It literally has no advantage." thank you for backing me up bro, troll on!!

I already explained that 10.70 is basically older builds of Opera 11. I added them to illustrate how tests depend on the things I mentioned.

I still don't understand what advantage you are saying that Chrome has. It certainly can't be performance, since there's no clear and objective winners since different tests show different things.

Troll, listen. You only even responded to me because I called someones blanket statement saying "Chrome loses. "It literally has no advantage". I then provided a series of 39 benchmark tests taken yesterday, showing Chrome as the leader out of all major browsers, overall, on all tests. You didnt even read the article and call me a "basher" when if you actually were intellectually honest youd have read the article, and seen that it actually states that Opera 11 is better in some tests. You then go on a Google manhunt, posting 4 links from tests where OPERA 11 isnt even tested, not the beta, nor the release. You posted them in seconds after my response, and again you didnt even read them, and are just trying to troll and fanboy Opera. I never said "Clunky" was objective, I said the benchmark tests were. That was your last half-assed effort to save a little face. Anyone that has read this thread, can see you are dishonest, an intellectual lightweight, you dont comprehend even what youve just read, are only trying to defend Opera, on arguments that arent even there. You sir, are a real dick head, and I wont be responding to you again. It would be an insult to my intelligence, to ARS bandwidth, and to anyones time that has had to read your pile of shit posting. Grow up.